Taxi
by B. Kennedy
Summary: A story about Jessie and Katie's potential future, set 8 years ahead and based on the song 'Taxi' by Harry Chapin
1. Too many miles and too little smiles

iIt was raining hard in Frisco  
  
I needed one more fare to make my night/i  
  
"Damn it!" I muttered and I watched through the rain as another cab swerved in front of me and skid to a stop beside a well dressed couple on the sidewalk.  
  
"There goes twenty bucks," I continued to myself. It's strange how talking to yourself in front of others seems maniacal but when alone it seems entirely fitting. Now was one of those times when venting to myself was the only thing keeping me from rear-ending the other cab with my own. "Get a grip, Katie", I warned myself, still out loud, "An accident will cost way more then next weeks rent..." I still found it hard to believe that after 8 years of living on my own, I still had to worry day and night about where my next rent check would be coming from and fight to make enough every week by driving a cab through downtown San Francisco.   
  
iA lady up ahead waved to flag me down  
  
She got in at the light/i  
  
As I drove desperately through the streets - slowing down for any prospective commuters who may want to come in from the rain - I spotted a flash of midnight blue ahead and a pale hand stretched, hailing me down. I swerved to the left and earned myself two horns honked for my troubles. I pulled up alongside the woman in blue and leaned across the taxi to prop open the passenger door because clearly the woman had her hands full holding her purse, and attempting to gather her gown in an orderly fashion. I was always looking for a way to charm my passengers into leaving a more generous tip then the usual dollar. On top of rent there''s food, heating, typewrite ink...  
  
i"Oh where you going to, my lady blue  
  
It's a shame you ruined your gown in the rain,"  
  
She just looked out the window  
  
She said "16 Parkside lane,"/i  
  
As the woman turned in her seat I realized I hadn't had a chance to catch more than a glimpse of her features. As soon as she faced me my breath caught in my throat and the required 'Where to?' died on my lips. I could do nothing but stare. Her blond hair hung damp over her face, not at all lessening the effect of the radiant blue eyes. And as those eyes peered into my own I realized they weren't unfamiliar. I looked her up and down, for once not even trying to mask my scrutiny of a female customer. I knew it all. Those pale hands playing mindlessly with the trim of her dress, the curve of her hips within the blue material, the swell of her breasts accentuated by the low cut neckline. I had seen this woman before.   
  
"16 Parkside Lane."   
  
Her voice awakened me, made me realize I hadn't moved the taxi. There were cars lined up behind me, honking and waving. The girl in the seat beside me was staring at me as though I had grown another head. Perhaps I had, that would explain the sudden wooziness that came over me as I met her eyes again.   
  
iSomething about her was familiar  
  
I could swear I'd seen her face before  
  
But she said "I'm sure you're mistaken,"  
  
And she didn't say anything more/i  
  
Before I even had time to think about it, to berate myself and tell myself not to be rude, it blurted out: "Do I know you?" Damn it! I just knocked a good 50 cents off of my tip. If there's one thing I've learned over the past 2 years in this job it was to keep my mouth shut. The passenger had to strike up conversation first or you're looking at 75 cents to a dollar, max. Sometimes people just want to be left alone.   
  
The woman hesitated slightly before turning to look out the window "No." she said simply.  
  
No? But that was impossible! I mean, it's true, I'd met - even had - my share of women but most of their faces have vanished in my mind before they''ve even made it all the way out of my bed much less the apartment. But something in those piercing eyes called to my mind, begged me to remember where I had seen them before. When had they once gazed into mine as they had only a minute ago?  
  
I knew I shouldn't push it, but as usual my mouth had detached itself from my brain, "Are you sure? Because you look very fam..."   
  
"You're mistaken, we've never met. I'm sorry," The way she added the last two words made me think that maybe she did recognize me but didn't want to address it. She couldn't possibly be one of those girls I'd never called back, could she? No, I would remember if I had been with a woman this beautiful. In fact, if I'd ever been with a girl this beautiful - this mesmerizing - I could never have let her go.   
  
We drove in silence. Her house was past the suburbs, we were in for a long awkward drive if it kept up this way.  
  
I watched her out of the corner of my eye. Her fingers were entwined with thread that she had pulled from her dress. I watched as she wrapped the string around her forefinger, loosely at first and then tight enough for the digit to turn a dark purple. I glanced at her face as she winced in pain. As I watched, her frown turned to a relieved smile. I could read the expression on her face. The feeling that any sensation is a good one, pain and pleasure are the same because they both mean you're alive. I recognized the expression because I felt the same a lot of the time. It's the result of a loneliness and longing that have combined into a desperation to feel anything at all. Life had become a long steam of these same emotions coursing through me as I drove. Day and night I drove my cab, watching happy people, sad people, lonely people climb in and out. Some told me their stories and each one made me long for what they had. Even if their story was a sad one, I still longed to have it because I had no story of my own. I knew no one in this city and had let go of all ties with anyone beyond it. Everyone who came into my life these days left just as quickly.  
  
All I did was drive and dream of fantastic things and intriguing stories. Because that's what I did with all my need and all those strangers stories. I had no stories of my own and so I created some. I turned my feelings and my knowledge of these cab customers into greater stories, epic stories written each day at my typewriter. Writing was what I lived for, driving my cab was how I managed to live at all. If anyone has ever told you that being a writer is an easy life then just remember: people lie.   
  
iIt took awhile but she looked in the mirror  
  
Then she glanced at the licence for my name  
  
A smile seemed to come to her slowly  
  
It was a sad smile just the same/i  
  
My eyes remained on the young woman as she glanced up at me and caught me staring. Her cheeks flushed and she smiled again, this time more certain. As soon as the slight smile reached her eyes and they shone their brilliant blue in the darkness, realization dawned and I nearly slammed on the brakes.   
  
'Oh God, it's her...'  
  
Once I'd made the connection, I couldn't grasp how it could have taken me so long to catch on. I studied her with my new knowledge and aside from her hair being darker blond and her face slightly more angular, the past 8 years hadn't changed her at all. No, that wasn't true. I sighed as I looked closer and noticed the sadness in her eyes and the permanent worry etched on her face. No, those hadn't been there before.   
  
It was as though the realization showed in my eyes because as I watched she peered at me curiously and finally glanced at my licence and registration displayed on the dashboard.   
  
iAnd she said "How are you Katie?"   
  
I said "Jessie, how are you?  
  
Through the too many miles and the too little smiles  
  
I still remember you,"/i  
  
She sighed, the sound that I remembered as having had so many meanings. "How are you Katie?"  
  
It seemed ironic somehow for those to be her first words to me, knowing my identity now. It seemed ironic because clearly neither of us was 'fine' or 'ok' as the typical re-acquaintance conversation rules required me to answer.   
  
So instead I simply laughed softly and returned with "Jessie, how are you?" 


	2. Somewhere in a fairytale

iIt was somewhere in a fairytale  
  
I used to take her home in my car  
  
We learned about love in the back of a Dodge  
  
The lesson hadn't gone too far/i  
  
She smiled at me but as before the smile didn't quite reach her eyes. When I didn't smile back, she bowed her head and when she raised it again it was as though she had covered her features with a mask. Instead of the false certainty she had before I saw an image of a trapped and lost girl and looking in her eyes for the first time in 8 years broke my heart again just as it had when I left Chicago all those years ago.   
  
iYou see, she was gonna be an actress  
  
And I was gonna learn to fly  
  
She took off to find the footlights  
  
I took off to find the sky/i  
  
It had been my senior year, junior for her when we had met and - as impossible as it seems to me now - fallen in love. As in most high school romances she overwhelmed my thoughts and although I knew that at the end of the year we would be headed for some hard times, I let her become my world. The span of forever never even seemed long enough for us to be together but instead of discussing the future and planning for it as we should have, we denied its existence which made the realizations we were forced to come to at graduation all the more painful. Before Jessie had come into my life, all I had wanted to do after I graduated was leave Chicago behind and create a life for myself far away from my family, away from their expectations and especially away from their drunken Christmas fights that had torn my home life apart. I had this crazy notion that the ideal way for me to make a living was to learn how to be a pilot which would let me spend all of my downtime writing my novels. Being a pilot is the kind of job where there is no homework and your schedule is pretty much set. If I was going to dedicate my life to my writing, I couldn't have the type of job where I would be on call like a doctor or have to do research in the evenings like a lawyer. I figured I would just bring my laptop with me overseas if I had to. Also, I figured there was no better exhibition of my reckless nature and no better way of telling my parents just how far away from them I intended to be now that I was no longer being kept prisoner under their roof.   
  
I loved Jessie more than I have ever loved anyone in my life, including myself. I was willing to sacrifice everything I had to in order to be with her, or so I thought. But when the time came to make a decision as to whether I would stay in Chicago for her last year of high school or head off and try to make it on my own, I realized there were in fact some things I was not willing to sacrifice after all. It killed some small part of my heart to do it, but when the offer came from the San Francisco School of Aviation to take part in their piloting program I accepted it and with a heavy heart I said good-bye to my first and only love. When I kissed Jessie for the last time, in late August the day before I was to start the long drive down to San Francisco, the look in her eye then was the same one she wore now, 8 years later and sitting in my cab.   
  
Jessie looked me over, an appraising look "So I guess the whole pilot thing didn't work out?" she laughed then, and the bitterness and irony that leaked out with her words struck me hard.   
  
iI've got something inside me   
  
To drive a princess blind   
  
She's hiding in me, illuminating my mind   
  
I've got something inside me   
  
Not what my life's about   
  
Cause I've been letting my outside tide me   
  
Over until my time runs out/i  
  
I just shrugged, I had made peace with my failure a few years ago and no one - not even Jessie - could make me feel worse then I had when I had first dropped out of the aviation program. I had always known school wasn't my place, but I hadn't realized that with no parents around to force me to go and no faculty that could be bothered chasing their students around that I wouldn't be able to handle having full control over my education.  
  
"And you? What are you up to now, Jess?"  
  
"It's Jessica now, um, Jessica Kaine," she emphasized the last word and for the first time I noticed the pear cut diamond ring she was fiddling with on her left hand. My breath caught in my throat and I looked up to the road only just in time to swerve away from the car that had been coming towards us. She was quiet until I had steadied the car and then she continued but to my relief, she had stopped playing with the ring.   
  
"Well, I tried to pursue acting for awhile and I got what you could call my 'big break' in the Los Angeles Workshop production of My Fair Lady but then I met Gregory and well, I haven't been doing as many shows the past few years. We just moved to San Francisco because Greg got the lead role in a new show that's being filmed here." She stopped then and I could do nothing but nod at her. I'd heard of her husband, Gregory Kaine was a very respected actor throughout California but was also known for his womanizing and substance abuse. I thought of mentioning that I had read about him in the tabloids but I decided against it, I mean I was still hoping for a good tip.   
  
"Well, congratulations, Jessica."  
  
"Do you mean that Katie?" I started at her then before responding. I had understood the conversation to be one had between any old friends, not lovers. This sudden reminder of our past together surprised me. Was I supposed to tell her how I really felt? How I still felt all these years, and all these miles later?  
  
I mirrored her laugh then, bitter with a touch of irony, "No, no I really don't."  
  
iThere was not much more for us to talk about   
  
Whatever we'd had once was gone/i  
  
We fell silent after that, everything we wanted to say seemed to be coming our harsh or judgmental. The years had changed us both, and unfortunately, it seemed that the changes had not been for the better. She sat with her beautiful blue eyes turned towards the window and for once I kept my eyes on the road. It was easier than looking at her and seeing the tangible evidence of the first of a thousand of my failures or acknowledging the silence that was speaking volumes.   
  
Who was it that once said "You can't go home again"? That had always seemed like a silly thing to say and I had never truly understood it - though to be fair school wasn't my strongest point - but now that one sentence played through my mind and it made sense to me at last. Once everything has changed in your life and everything has changed in the lives of the people you loved, you see that you can can't ever return 'home' to the place where you were young because it's never how you left it. Over the past few years when I've briefly let myself remember Jessie, I had seen her how she was. Hopeful, vibrant and full of expectations for her life and for our life together. I had chosen to see her unchanged and on those dark nights when I was feeling so alone that I drank myself to sleep, I let her be home to me. I would imagine myself returning to Chicago a year from now or sometimes ten years from now and falling into her arms and being young and innocent and seventeen again.   
  
iSo I turned my cab into the driveway   
  
Past the gate and the fine trimmed lawns/i  
  
The silence dragged on for what seemed like ages though I knew it was only minutes and then I saw the street name she had given me and with a burning pain in my heart, I turned left onto Parkside Lane. The estates on this street all had lush green lawns and individual gates meant to keep intruders, and perhaps scorned lovers, at bay.   
  
I drove up the street slowly, scanning for number 16 and wondering which of the massive houses was the elegant cage for Jessie's tattered life.   
  
Jessie also had been looking out the window and said quietly but with a touch of urgency, "It's the grey one up there on your left."   
  
iAnd she said we must get together   
  
But I knew it'd never be arranged/i  
  
I had already spotted it up ahead and was turning through the open gates and on to the long lane at the end of which there lay a distinguished house - no, mansion - with a magnificent garden and stone statue in the front. We sat in strained silence for a moment before Jessie spoke "We should, um, get together for coffee or dinner sometime. To catch up, you know," but even as she spoke those words, I could see in her turned away face and the way she averted her eyes that she had no intention of carrying out her own request. This inkling of mine was further proven because neither of us even bothered to ask for the others phone number. Harsh reality set in and any hope I had of rekindling our past romance was extinguished. We lived in separate worlds now and I was clearly not welcome in hers, nor - and I realized this with a start - was she welcome in mine.   
  
iAnd she handed me fifty dollars for a twenty dollar fare,   
  
She said "Katie, keep the change"/i  
  
She looked at the meter that indicated how much the fare would be and before I had a chance to tell her not to worry about it, she pulled a fifty dollar bill from one of her bags and pressed it into my hand. As she looked at me then, I finally saw in her eyes what I had been hoping to see all evening, I saw the true Jessie looking out at me with sincerity and pain and I knew it would be the last time I ever looked into those deep cerulean eyes.   
  
I opened my mouth to protest just as she said "Katie, keep the change." The look on her face now was much less welcome and I felt myself begin to fume at the pity I saw in her eyes.   
  
iWell another person might have been angry   
  
And another person might have been hurt   
  
But another person never would have let her go   
  
I stashed the bill in my purse/i  
  
'Who does she think she is, waltzing along into my new life and passing judgement? How dare she insult the way I've chosen to live my life? Who says I need anything from her, let alone her money?' All these thoughts bubbled to the surface of my mind and just as I was about to open my mouth and unleash it all upon her, another thought pushed to the front, 'And who were you to let her go in the first place? Isn't it your own fault that you're stuck in this awful existence, not to mention the awful existence she's living as well? You could have saved her from a terrible marriage and an empty life, but instead you were too selfish to wait for her for one more year. Just take the damn money and get the hell out of here.'  
  
As she got out of the car, I stashed the fifty in my purse between two packs of cigarettes and muttered a wounded 'Thank you'.  
  
iAnd she walked away in silence   
  
It's strange how you never know   
  
But we'd both gotten what we'd asked for   
  
Such a long, long time ago   
  
You see she was gonna be an actress   
  
And I was gonna learn to fly   
  
She took off to find the footlights   
  
And I took off for the sky/i  
  
I watched her as she made her way up the walkway and took her keys from her purse to unlock the door. I could have offered to carry her bags for her, or at least driven up closer to the door but I had wanted to make things difficult for her. It was payment really, because unbeknownst to her, her just having been in the wrong place at the wrong time today would haunt my sleep for months to come. Had I not seen her today, I could have gone on pretending my life was the way I wanted it to be, and I could have gone on living the way I was but she had forced the contrast of our lives upon me and I was made to realize some things would have to change if I was going to make something of myself, ever.   
  
iAnd here she's acting happy   
  
Inside her handsome home/i  
  
Suddenly, the writer part of me took over and I laughed out loud as I saw the irony in our situations. You see, all those years ago Jessie had dreamed of putting on shows, of expressing feelings, desires, and dreams of characters that were not her. And now, I watched her face as her cheating husband wrapped his arms around her on the front steps of their magnificent home and I realized that in a way she had gotten what she wanted. I realized that she spent her life acting happy when underneath that facade was the same insecure, vulnerable girl I had fallen in love with when we were too blind to see the tumultuous lives that lay ahead of us.   
  
iAnd me I'm flying in my taxi   
  
Taking tips and getting stoned/i  
  
And as for me, I had dreamed of flying high above cities, soaring over oceans and escaping the life I had been born in to. I laughed then, a bitter lonely sound, as I pulled a joint from my purse and set it to my lips, my lighter poised in front of me. Well, I certainly spent a lot of time flying here in my taxi, and escape sounded pretty damn good right now. 


	3. A sequel to our story

I got into town a little early  
  
Had eight hours to kill before the show  
  
I thought about heading up north of the Bay  
  
But then I knew where I had to go  
  
I whistled to myself as I stepped off the plane at San Francisco National Air Park, the breeze at the top of the steps was crisp and clean on my face as it played through my long ash blond hair. The wind was refreshing after 4 hours of breathing recycled air inside the cabin.   
  
"Back in Frisco, who would have thought?" I muttered to myself as I made my way across the tarmac to the double doors leading inside and in the mean time struggled to hoist my two large bags across my shoulders  
  
"Did you say something Katie?" asked my agent and one time girlfriend Anita. As she waited for an answer she disentangled me from one of my bags and threw it over her shoulder with her own smaller luggage.   
  
"Nothing worth repeating." I smiled at her then, because I had realized that my earlier question hadn't been accurate at all because I had known, ever since that rainy day 5 years ago when I first left San Francisco that I would be back. Unfinished business doesn't sit long in my life if there was any one word to describe my relationship with Jessie Sammler - sorry, Jessica Kaine - it was 'unfinished'.  
  
"Damn, we're way ahead of schedule, your book reading isn't until 9 o'clock," Anita said as she shifted the luggage to catch a glimpse of her watch.  
  
"How ahead of time?" I asked, and she grimaced knowing how much I hate wasting time. I had discovered early on in life that to waste time was equivalent to early death and now that my life was back on track I had seized the motto 'live life to the fullest' and run with it.   
  
She grimaced again and tugged on one of her long black curls, a clear sign of guilt, "Um, about eight hours..." And then, to Anita's surprise, I laughed. She looked at me curiously and I giggled again. "Fate works in mysterious ways, my dear," I said.  
  
"What do you...? Oh! Really? Awesome, Katie, just be back in time for the book reading. In fact, if all goes well, bring her with you." I hugged Anita tightly and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. I was glad that I had found a friend who knew what I was thinking without me having to put it into words. The last person who had understood me that well was Jessie and that had been 13 years ago when we'd first become best friends and then lovers.  
  
I thought about taking a limousine  
  
Or at least a fancy car  
  
But I ended up taking a taxi  
  
Because that's how I got this far  
  
I unloaded the rest of my bags onto my entourage which included Anita and my other close friend Jayson. I explained to Jayson quickly where I was going and who I was going to see. When I first met Jayson and Anita I had no intention of telling them the 'sordid' Jessie story but after a long night of drinking and drugs in New York City, the whole thing came out in a tumble of words and tears. Together, they had helped me deal with my various vices and that same night I gave up my substance abuse and started getting my act together again.   
  
I walked away from my two best friends and the further I got from them, the less sure I seemed to be of my plan. I turned to look at them and, as though sensing my fear, they both turned back and gave me the thumbs up simultaneously. We all laughed at that and I instantly felt better about what I was about to do.   
  
I walked out to the front of the airport. I had the number for the limousine we were supposed to take to the hotel but I decided to leave it for the others. It seemed fair because I only had my small shoulder bag left and they were carrying all my things. It was the least I could do, really.   
  
So I stepped up to the curb and, after 5 years of living in New York City, expertly hailed a taxi within the minute.   
  
You see, five years ago it was the front seat  
  
Driving stoned and feeling no pain  
  
I climbed in the back seat of the taxi, as my customers had done years ago. I shot the cabbie a smile because I remembered how invisible you could feel sometimes in that job. You see, I hadn't always been a successful newspaper columnist turned novelist. In fact, it was only 5 years ago that I spent my days driving a taxi and getting high and spent my nights hunched over my typewriter, churning out story after story and... getting high...   
  
Now here I am straight, and sitting in the back  
  
Hitting 16 Parkside Lane   
  
But now, writing had become my full time job and I tried to avoid taxis as much as I could except today it seemed fitting somehow. Had I never driven a taxi or had I not been on a particular street in San Francisco 5 years ago today, I would never have picked Jessie up in my cab and we may have gone the rest of our lives wondering what happened to each other after graduation. Not that seeing each other again had changed the nature of our relationship but it had been an instigator for cleaning up my act and pursuing my dreams.   
  
I fidgeted again as the driver looked at me in the rearview mirror.  
  
"Where to, lady?" he said around his cigarette.  
  
I hesitated again though only briefly this time, "16 Parkside Lane, please sir."  
  
The driveway was the same as I remembered  
  
And a butler came and answered the door  
  
The neighborhood was a shorter drive from the airport than it had been the day I picked Jessie up. Within 15 minutes the driver was pulling up in front of the stately old house that I had seen night after night in my dreams. I remembered that day so well that I expected to see Jessie come out the front door wearing that magnificent blue dress, blond hair sparkling in the sun shine. The only difference being that even though I had seen her for the last time 5 years ago, I still pictured her as she was in high school - vibrant, youthful and magnificent - every inch the girl I had fallen in love with and then abandoned so cruelly.   
  
He just shook his head when I asked for her  
  
And said she doesn't live here any more   
  
I walked up the long driveway as though walking to my doom. I approached slowly, I figured she didn't know I was coming so it didn't really matter how long it took me to get there. The longer the better, in fact though I knew deep down I was simply being cowardly which was one trait I had tried to rid myself of ever since I took off after I graduated. With that thought my confidence renewed and I marched straight up to the door and rang the doorbell. I could hear it sounding inside and once again I thought of someone walking to their boom, a resounding gong in the distance.   
  
The door swung open and I actually closed my eyes in fear before opening them slowly one at a time. I had the thought then that if Jessie did actually answer the door, her first sight of me in 5 years would be one of a clearly stalker like girl squinting creepily on her front porch. I opened my eyes all the way and saw that in the place of the familiar face I had anticipated was a middle aged man wearing a suit. He was clearly the Kaine's butler so I cleared my throat and stammered in a very un-Katie like way "Um, is Jessie here? Or Jessica, Jessice Kaine?"  
  
The butler gave me the once over as though by my appearance alone he would decide whether or not I was worthy enough to speak to Mrs. Kaine. "Your name?" he asked finally.  
  
I blinked, I hadn't expected this. I guess a good butler has to introduce guests or some rich person garbage like that. "Katie Singer," I said.  
  
But he offered to give me the address   
  
That they were forwarding her letters to  
  
I just took it and returned to the cabby and said  
  
"I've got one more fare for you"   
  
He looked surprised at that but recovered himself quickly, "Well Ms. Singer... Katie, Jessie doesn't live here anymore. She moved out two years ago, to an apartment in the city. I have the address if you'll just give me a moment to get it."  
  
"Oh sure, that would be great thanks," My heart was in my throat as he ushered me in the front door and walked back through the grand entry way towards what I assumed was the kitchen. So Jessie and Gregory weren't together anymore. My brain tried to process this information but all I could think was that Jessie was single, Jessie could be mine again... Jessie might hate me and want nothing to do with me. This thought snuck in again as it usually did when my Katie/Jessie fantasies got out of hand. I had left Jessie back in Chicago when I moved to San Francisco and I knew from our brief meeting in my cab that she certainly hadn't forgiven me for that oversight.   
  
I hovered in the entry way and while I waited, I looked at all the pictures displayed there. I felt that old familiar lump of tears building in my throat again as I went from frame to frame. Jessie and Gregory on their wedding day... Jessie and Gregory on their honeymoon... Jessie and Gregory holding a baby (a baby?!)... Jessie and Gregory in L.A when he won his first Academy Award... my God, he'd gotten to live the life I had wanted with Jessie, the life I had stupidly thrown away on a whim. I worried for a second that he would come down the stairs and I wasn't sure I would be able to stop myself pouring out all my anger and regret on him.   
  
The butler returned then with a small piece of paper in his hand and he held it out to me tentatively. "Here you are Katie, I trust Ms. Sammler will be happy to see you again," and before I could respond through my surprise he had ushered me back out the door and to the waiting cab.   
  
I stumbled back to the cab, still surprised that the butler had known who I was. Perhaps he hadn't, perhaps he just assumed I was an old friend coming to call on Jess. But I remembered his knowing gaze when I had introduced myself. No, he definitely knew who I was which meant Jessie hadn't forgotten about me completely. I climbed in the back of the cab and the driver looked at me expectantly. "It's your lucky night, I've got a long fare for you," I told him the second address and we were off, back into San Francisco. 


	4. End of the line

Note: Sorry this took so long to update, and it's also really short but I've had life getting in the way of writing unfortunately. The next part will be along much quicker though, I promise! Thanks for all the feedback as well, it's nice to know the story is being read. 

~~~~

iSo we rolled back into the city

Up to a five story old brownstone

I rang the bell that had her name on the mailbox

The buzzer said somebody's home/i

The quiet roll back into the city and then across town to her neighborhood took almost 45 minutes and the whole ride there my body was tight with anticipation. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't sexual, it was simply that the moment I realized that I was actually going to see Jessie again a sort of natural awareness overcame me. You would think I would be terrified because of the way I left her and what happened between us when we finally saw each other again but instead I felt calm and truly alive for the first time in years.

"End of the line," the older man at the wheel mumbled as we pulled into a laneway on a small back street. He feigned indifference but I could see his eyes light up as I extracted 75 dollars from my satchel and placed it in his outstretched palm. 

For the second time this afternoon, I made my way up Jessie's walkway and up onto the porch. The apartment building was one of those old brownstone manors that had been renovated and divided into 6 compartments, each probably having one or two bedrooms. The wall beside the front door had six mailboxes, each one with a name and a buzzer. I scanned down the list and with each name, my pulse became more erratic and my breathing more labored. M. Ahuja, K. Gluekler, H. Johnson, G. McMitchel... J. Sammler. As my eye caught her name, I swear my heart skipped a beat and I stopped breathing completely and my hands shook as I rang the bell and heard the answering buzz that meant the person inside was coming to the door. 


End file.
